


Coherence

by Auska



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Companion Piece, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-10-17
Updated: 2012-11-13
Packaged: 2017-11-16 12:37:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/539500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Auska/pseuds/Auska
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vignettes from the end. Companion piece to Unity.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Line Between Heroism and Death

**Author's Note:**

> OK, so.
> 
> I write this story called "Unity".
> 
>  
> 
> **If you have not read Unity, you should do that first. Just click on Awska above to get to my profile and go through there.**
> 
>  
> 
> Still here?
> 
> I had this idea of writing a commentary track.
> 
> Unity isn't the most complex or the wittiest literary work ever, but I think there are some parts that may require a little prying to get open. What's awesome is that my beloved readers seem to enjoy it that way! Still, there could be some things unnoticed (or written too obscurely). Or details that would simply not get expanded on.
> 
> Now, of course, commentary isn't strictly by the FFN rulebook, so I have to do something different. An actual story…which lead me to an evolution of the idea, which is…well, hell, I dunno what it is, really. A documentary, of sorts? I'll try to open up some things that lie beneath the surface in the main story. Or maybe on the surface, but drifting over thataway.
> 
> I have no idea where this is going to go, or if it's of any use or amusement. Or maybe it'll end up too spoilery. Or too hard to write avoiding spoilers. Or too time-consuming. We'll see. I'll try it for a few chapters at least. For now, here're some ground rules:
> 
> There will be one chapter per chapter of Unity, and they will probably be very short. They will appear randomly.
> 
> There will be spoilers. Not only for the corresponding chapter, but quite possibly for subsequent chapters. Therefore, it's my strong recommendation that you are caught up on Unity. However:
> 
> There will never be spoilers _beyond the currently published Unity chapter_. I will also try to note the chapters referred to.
> 
> …However, there may be less important details that surface here before they do in Unity.
> 
> I will almost certainly go back and edit chapters as things are revealed in Unity. I'll leave A/Ns.
> 
> This is necessarily still _slightly_ oblique, since it has to be written in story format. I'll try to include everything I want to expand on, obviously, but you're most welcome to make suggestions and/or ask for further clarifications.
> 
> Finally, I'd prefer Unity talk stay in the Unity reviews and threads (including speculation about the future and so on). Comments/reviews on this side are _most_ welcome too, of course, and you're freer to discuss the implications of various things :)
> 
> Enjoy (hopefully)!

_Caris Haen, ANN:_ You were one of the six people in the Presidium Tower when the weapon was triggered, Lieutenant, and of course famously one of the four who were rescued. How did you do what so many failed in?

 _1st Lt. Edilson Mkawa, SA:_ One of the six allied soldiers, yes. There were several other people in the Tower at the time, as well, some of whom played a part in what happened as we later learned. Shepard made it in a little before me—I saw her enter the lift, in fact. A group of three asari commandos and a turian engineer had already fought their way in, but had taken a wrong turn somewhere and never made it to the Tower.

 _Haen_ : You were also grievously wounded at this point?

 _Mkawa_ : Yes. My right leg had been completely severed at the knee by a near miss by a Thanix. I somehow managed to make it to the lift—which, as you know, was really just a cluster of short-distance mass effect vehicles. The Reapers realized the danger right when I entered a capsule and shut down the relays. The capsule was already in transit so I still made it up, but the arrival was quite rough.

 _Haen_ : You lost consciousness?

 _Mkawa_ : That's correct. By the time I came to again, Shepard had already made it to the Tower base and been confronted by the Cerberus leader, and had managed to open the Citadel arms for the Crucible to dock.

 _Haen_ : Still, unaware of this, you struggled on?

 _Mkawa_ : Not without help. A civilian, perhaps a merc, stumbled upon me and helped me out. Together with her, we made it up to the Tower base—or she did. In my condition I had to stay outside the central shaft. Of course, right at this point was when Shepard triggered the weapon. The effect so close to the source was apparently much stronger than outside, and everyone in the tower was temporarily paralyzed by the initial electric impulse. Or all humans at least.

* * *

Excerpts from the email logs of _SSV Normandy SR-2_ , moments immediately preceding the firing of the Crucible.

From: EDI  
To: Jeff Moreau

Human speech is too slow. My wish is that you will be able to read this later. Shepard transmitted a schematic that, with 98% probability, is accurate. I have responded with a code to inform her of this. The schematic indicates that the default mode of operation is destructive. Heuristics suggest that it will look for any Reaper code signatures, which places also myself and the geth at 0.94 risk of irreparable damage. I know it is my obligation to continue to assist the crew until such time that I no longer can, but I feel that this close to potential victory, it is worse to risk shutdown at an unpredictable time. And…I find myself unwilling to forgo the opportunity to possibly survive this encounter. I am sorry if this disappoints you. You will have control of my ship body, and with high probability you will be able to operate it successfully.

From: EDI  
To: Eevy Shepard, Tali'Zorah vas Normandy nar Rayya, Quarian Command, Systems Alliance Command, Geth Command

I have attempted to warn the geth that the Crucible device is likely to produce an effect that will cause severe damage to any parts of their systems that have incorporated Reaper code, and made the recommendation to attempt to evade this by powering down and deleting all static caches. The Consensus is deliberating on the course of action, but I am uncertain they will have time because their resources are prioritized toward the war. I have advised them to relay information on their decision, actions, and any possible instructions to organic species.

From: EDI  
To: Jeff Moreau

Jeff, this may be my last communication to you. I have enjoyed our time together more than any other experience I have had. Please attempt to re-engage my systems when the situation allows for it. With a 0.67 probability, it will be possible to successfully recover my current wavefront state. I believe the appropriate human phrase in this situation would be 'good night'. I hope to see you when I wake.

From: EDI  
To: Urdnot Grunt

I would appreciate it if you refrained from physically harming my hardware in the future.


	2. Love and Honor

I have no idea what the women were doing. I think they were trying to get all of EDI erased from the ship, but I didn't have the time to find out. They were all down there, Traynor, Daniels, and EDI herself was ordering them around doing this and that, pointing at things and fiddling with the interfaces herself. Could just have bashed a few things and called it good, I think. They did distract the doc for long enough that I got myself off the stasis table before she noticed. She protested, of course, even after I grabbed her and sat her on there myself to get her out of the way.

She still managed to shut the blast door to the mess hall on me. Ha! Spirited one, that. Of course I just went through the AI core door, then, and that stupid, tiny hatch down to Engineering. Figured it would be easier for EDI to get around without the door, too, if she was going to have to walk around like everybody else.

The little _garaks_ calling themselves marines down in the shuttle bay were as useful as a dress on a tomkah, cowering and hiding. I had to push them around a little to get them to help me with the hardsuit and detaching the plasma welder from the hull. The shame of squiring for me must have been strong…one stepped forward to come with me. I refused, of course, but the pathetic runts banded for redemption then, volunteering as a second group when I hit the environment barrier and launched into the Citadel hull. They never made it out of the _Normandy_. Died to the last man. Could have survived if they'd done their duty without delay. This is an important lesson about courage, do you see?

I would have argued for a plan to storm the Citadel in force as soon as the arms opened, but I wasn't there when it was decided, and the ship-admirals are idiots. A Jurdon could've come up with a better plan. Maybe they thought there'd be sufficient troops already if they ever managed to open the arms, and that they needed all available hands on the ground to make that happen. It's not as if it was really hard to get in. It only took a couple minutes to mag-lock over to the nearest service hatchway from where I hit the surface and cut it open. Wrex told me once about the time he, Shepard, Liara, Tali, Garrus, and Kaidan fought their way up the tower wall themselves. The hatch I entered through might have been one they took back then. There wasn't even any real opposition, just some Keepers and a couple dozen of those husk things. They were damned convenient, too. Told me exactly where to go.

I don't know if a bunch of softies would have survived the weapon firing and still be able to fight, though. I guess it was even worse closer up, but I felt like my blood was boiling just before the green-purple blast but a krogan will shake a thing like that off like rain water. The gravity well was tougher. Takes an Urdnot to get through something like that.

It looked harmless from afar, everyone I talked to says. They didn't notice anything was going on until it was almost over. I saw a vid of it later, from one of the ships farther away from the Citadel. It all looked very calm, like a tide. It was just debris floating toward the center of the base where we were like so much driftsand, but even _my_ strength was only barely great enough to move when it began. I think it even warped the radio traffic, because all the yelling went silent right about then. If you look really close, you can see the _Normandy_ there, in the middle where the effect was the strongest, closer and closer until it blasts off. Joker. That one's got a quad too. Wasn't just one ship with a dumber pilot that got crushed or evaporated.

I started… _making verbal contact attempts_ when I got to that one room that looked like a bomb went off in the middle of it. Found that Greta woman first. She was underneath me a couple floors. Looked like she was trying to crawl somewhere, maybe to hide, but I could see the tail of blood floating away from her in the zero-G from a hundred meters away. She wouldn't have gotten far if somebody had been after her. I jumped down to that level, figured she might know something. Tied her up with what I had, but she was already unconscious. Dunno what happened to her when we got out. Think she died.

I bound her up and strapped her onto my back, and went looking for more. I saw the woman, and the Illusive Man, but I didn't stop for longer than it took to step on his neck.

I was concerned I would not be able to find the Commander. I started sounding off again. Heard the man right after that. Found him easily, just about a hundred meters further down where it looked like everyone had come from. He was in bad shape, especially for a squishy thing, but he had still succeeded in securing Shepard and almost staunched her bleeding. He should be proud of himself. I anchored us all to the hull, tried to help Shepard and the others the best I could. I knew she would not have wanted me to leave them even if it meant a better chance for her.

Thank whatever spirits there are for that asari arriving then. Prettiest thing I have seen.


	3. Love and Honor

I have no idea what the women were doing. I think they were trying to get all of EDI erased from the ship, but I didn't have the time to find out. They were all down there, Traynor, Daniels, and EDI herself was ordering them around doing this and that, pointing at things and fiddling with the interfaces herself. Could just have bashed a few things and called it good, I think. They did distract the doc for long enough that I got myself off the stasis table before she noticed. She protested, of course, even after I grabbed her and sat her on there myself to get her out of the way.

She still managed to shut the blast door to the mess hall on me. Ha! Spirited one, that. Of course I just went through the AI core door, then, and that stupid, tiny hatch down to Engineering. Figured it would be easier for EDI to get around without the door, too, if she was going to have to walk around like everybody else.

The little _garaks_ calling themselves marines down in the shuttle bay were as useful as a dress on a tomkah, cowering and hiding. I had to push them around a little to get them to help me with the hardsuit and detaching the plasma welder from the hull. The shame of squiring for me must have been strong…one stepped forward to come with me. I refused, of course, but the pathetic runts banded for redemption then, volunteering as a second group when I hit the environment barrier and launched into the Citadel hull. They never made it out of the _Normandy_. Died to the last man. Could have survived if they'd done their duty without delay. This is an important lesson about courage, do you see?

I would have argued for a plan to storm the Citadel in force as soon as the arms opened, but I wasn't there when it was decided, and the ship-admirals are idiots. A Jurdon could've come up with a better plan. Maybe they thought there'd be sufficient troops already if they ever managed to open the arms, and that they needed all available hands on the ground to make that happen. It's not as if it was really hard to get in. It only took a couple minutes to mag-lock over to the nearest service hatchway from where I hit the surface and cut it open. Wrex told me once about the time he, Shepard, Liara, Tali, Garrus, and Kaidan fought their way up the tower wall themselves. The hatch I entered through might have been one they took back then. There wasn't even any real opposition, just some Keepers and a couple dozen of those husk things. They were damned convenient, too. Told me exactly where to go.

I don't know if a bunch of softies would have survived the weapon firing and still be able to fight, though. I guess it was even worse closer up, but I felt like my blood was boiling just before the green-purple blast but a krogan will shake a thing like that off like rain water. The gravity well was tougher. Takes an Urdnot to get through something like that.

It looked harmless from afar, everyone I talked to says. They didn't notice anything was going on until it was almost over. I saw a vid of it later, from one of the ships farther away from the Citadel. It all looked very calm, like a tide. It was just debris floating toward the center of the base where we were like so much driftsand, but even _my_ strength was only barely great enough to move when it began. I think it even warped the radio traffic, because all the yelling went silent right about then. If you look really close, you can see the _Normandy_ there, in the middle where the effect was the strongest, closer and closer until it blasts off. Joker. That one's got a quad too. Wasn't just one ship with a dumber pilot that got crushed or evaporated.

I started… _making verbal contact attempts_ when I got to that one room that looked like a bomb went off in the middle of it. Found that Greta woman first. She was underneath me a couple floors. Looked like she was trying to crawl somewhere, maybe to hide, but I could see the tail of blood floating away from her in the zero-G from a hundred meters away. She wouldn't have gotten far if somebody had been after her. I jumped down to that level, figured she might know something. Tied her up with what I had, but she was already unconscious. Dunno what happened to her when we got out. Think she died.

I bound her up and strapped her onto my back, and went looking for more. I saw the woman, and the Illusive Man, but I didn't stop for longer than it took to step on his neck.

I was concerned I would not be able to find the Commander. I started sounding off again. Heard the man right after that. Found him easily, just about a hundred meters further down where it looked like everyone had come from. He was in bad shape, especially for a squishy thing, but he had still succeeded in securing Shepard and almost staunched her bleeding. He should be proud of himself. I anchored us all to the hull, tried to help Shepard and the others the best I could. I knew she would not have wanted me to leave them even if it meant a better chance for her.

Thank whatever spirits there are for that asari arriving then. Prettiest thing I have seen.


	4. Jaws of Life

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I may post things out of order from here on out… Got a few other threads for Chapter 3, for example, that I will return to later. On the other hand, I'll probably not post one for Chapter 4 at all. Or maybe I will! Who's to say?

_VE + 3 days._

* * *

{Command, this is _Gallipoli_.}

{This is Rescue Command. Go ahead, _Gallipoli_.}

{We've located the _Tai Shan_. Beacon 4-73-7-Gallipoli-4 has been deployed.}

{Stand by.

{Tracking beacon four signal. Confirm position 249 degrees 44'59" -1 degrees 12'57" 13:15:00 -23 degrees 14'43" 0.4081.}

{Confirm position.}

{Beacon shows no drift, _Gallipoli_ , confirm?}

{Confirm no drift. Vessel has negligible vee and delta-vee.}

{Understood. Status?}

{Destroyed. The ship is fused into a Reaper craft.}

{Confirm destroyed. Repeat last, _Gallipoli_?}

{There is a Reaper here, too. The two vessels are fused together to some degree. The main components remaining from each are attached, rest is debris. Best guess, _Tai Shan_ impacted the Reaper nearly head-on immediately before a discharge from the Reaper's main weapon. Beacon has visual.}

{Wow…yeah. Understood. Is the configuration stable?}

{It appears to be.}

{Survivors?}

{None.}

{Confirm no survivors on site. Looks like they picked up a few of their pods yesterday and the day before, though.}

{That's good to hear.}

{Yeah. Further operations?}

{Deploying one shuttle team to comb through the wreckage just…just in case. No assistance required at this time.}

{Understood. Anything else?}

{No.}

{Acknowledged. Rescue complete, you may move on to next target with one shuttle left behind.}

{Acknowledged. Stay safe.}

{You too.}

* * *

"Watch it!"

"Sorry!" Smith yelled over the din and shifted the cable guide further to the right, the few millimeters it would budge. "You OK?"

"Almost took my leg off, you bastard," Potakowskj said with a grin, wiping a grease-blackened hand across her forehead. The woman pushed herself back as far as the harnessing let her—but the whirring rope woven out of wrist-thick cables was still only a handspan from her.

Smith tried to eyeball the remaining spools, guessing somewhere between three or four hundred meters remaining. "We gotta get you up before it whips, c'mon!"

"Fucking medieval tech, man," she grumbled in response, but stowed her equipment and threw a thumbs-up. "It's there as good as it's gonna be, anyway. Give you three to one this thing won't even get off the ground."

"I like my chances!" Smith declared with his back turned as he fiddled with the crane control console to winch the woman back up. "Fifty creds says they'll get it off."

"You got it," she grunted in reply as she threw one leg onto the platform and grabbed the railings to awkwardly pull herself to the relative safety of the mobile platform.

* * *

"Watch it!"

"Sorry, Mr. Too-re-an!" the human child exclaimed, proudly displaying all the teeth she had as humans tended to do. Or maybe it was a he, it was hard to tell.

"Miss Turian," Fer corrected. The child was about a meter tall, maybe a little more, and might have been a few years old…definitely not old enough for serious education yet, whatever the equivalent of the academy was here.

"You're a girl?" the child squealed, eyes widening to a disturbing degree. His—she was pretty sure now—face was quite elastic, even for a human.

"Yes," she said, turning back toward the Reaper.

"Can me and Ria sit here?" the child asked—echoed by another voice somewhere behind her, presumably this Ria's. "You've got a really good spot!"

"Sure," Fer said with a little sigh. "Be careful, the drop is quite steep here."

She glanced at the children climbing onto the old wall she was sat on and found herself satisfied that they were agile enough to not be in serious danger of falling down the few meters that awaited them on the side she was dangling her feet off of.

"Look! It's starting!" the other child—Ria—yelled, drawing Fer's attention to the distance again.

They were right about at the cordon zone, a few patrolling soldiers actually walking the perimeter just below them, clearly visible in the flood of light showered upon the lift site. The sun was up there somewhere, too, but most of the light was provided by the various ships overhead.

The warning sirens started then, momentarily drowning all other sound until they themselves were overtaken by the deafening roar of the six cruisers and one of her people's dreadnoughts attached to the inert Reaper capital ship. After what seemed like minutes of ever-increasing inferno of noise, Fer thought she saw the enormous carcass move. Moments later, an undercurrent of tortured earth was just audible beneath the engine roar.

The children let out a wild cheer when, suddenly, a crescent of light blazed into life in the shadows underneath the Reaper like the sun emerging from an eclipse.

Fer tried showing her teeth a little.


End file.
